In this ShowbizU interview, host Tim Kashani talks with Ovation Award‑winning director Brian Kite about his journey from a child actor in community theater to a seasoned director, educator, and producing artistic director of La Mirada Theatre. Kite recounts his early fascination with Bugsy Malone, his undergraduate acting studies at UCLA, and his first professional experiences in New York, including a long‑run in Grandma Sylvia’s Funeral. He describes how hands‑on directing work at French Woods Festival and the summer‑camp circuit led him to pursue an MFA in directing, giving him formal credentials. After graduating, a chance call from Jeff Brown, the then‑executive director of La Mirada, launched Kite’s administrative career; he eventually succeeded Brown and now runs the 1,300‑seat venue while also teaching at UCLA and freelancing as a director. The conversation turns to the tension between the business side of running a multi‑million‑dollar theater and the creative impulse that drives his work, with Kite emphasizing the need for balance and community‑focused art. He also reflects on the mentors, peers, and institutional support (French Woods, UCLA classmates, board work with LA Stage Alliance) that have shaped his path.
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Ovation Award-winning director Brian Kite keeps busy at the La Mirada Theatre as the producing artistic director and director. He also guides students as a professor at UCLA. Brian shares his journey about how he juggles roles and remains passionate as an artist.
I started doing theater as an actor when I was, you know, young or something like that, 11 years old and Bugsy Malone and my Community Theater, which I had watched the movie enough times and seen Scott Baio do it that I knew every word, word for word. And it was easy to just go into the audition and do it exactly like that. I wasn't actually acting, I don't think. I was just imitating him. That's what started it. And then I studied acting at UCLA as an undergrad. And after UCLA, I was in New York for a little while. Started a theater company here in Los Angeles, Buffalo Nights Theater Company, with a lot of people from UCLA. And we did some theater here. Then moved to New York, and in New York, I started as an actor there. I was in Grandma Sylvia's Funeral, which was a show that ran for about 5 or 6 years in New York, and I did it for about 2 and a half years on and off as an actor, and it was a large cast, maybe 22 or 25 people, something like that, and I started, the director was in the show and was busy putting understudies in, replacements, but there were always understudies and replacements. And I had been directing at performing arts summer camp and some places in upstate New York.
Which of the summer camps?
French Woods Festival of the Performing Arts.
That's where my wife went.
Oh, that's right. I forgot that connection. Of course, that's a great connection. And I knew that she was there just before me, I think, as a matter of fact.
It's either French Woods or Stage Door.
I thought you have the choice and the rivalry is fierce. Okay, but I was French Woods.
All right.
And then I was a staff member there, and I ran the theater program there for about 7, almost 8 years. So I directed a lot, a large musical, small plays, whatever it was. And after talking to the director of Grandma Sylvie's Funeral, after a while he just said, do you want to start doing some of these replacements and understudy rehearsals? And I just kind of took that over, and I was doing that for a long time. So suddenly I think I was a director. I then did the Philadelphia company of that show. And just started getting more directing things after that.
So had you had any formal education as a director? Was it—
so it was mostly hands-on doing it with the theater company here at French Woods, then with Grandma Sylvia's. And with that lack of formal, which weighed on me a little bit, I eventually decided to go back to grad school and I got an MFA in directing. So now I have formal— you can tell it's different. I've had formal Directing education.
Were the other folks in your class with you, you had a lot of experience first being an actor and then getting real-world experience. Did you find the demographic similar to other people?
When I was getting my MFA? Well, there were only 3 of us in the program. Okay. One, she had not spent as much time directing. The other guy I actually knew. In fact, he was from French Woods as well. It turns out everybody I know is from French Woods. And, uh, he also had been working as a director, so it was good. Sometimes, for example, the class at UCLA right now, I teach there, they're all almost straight out of undergrad, several of them, so they're directors who just left undergrad. We had all been working for about 10 years before we went back to school in my year, so that was nice. Yeah, helps you focus a little bit on what you really want to do and what you want to explore and figure out in grad school. When I got out of grad school, I Got a call from Jeff Brown, who was the executive director at La Mirada Theater for the Performing Arts. And about 10 years before that, I had been on the board of LA Stage Alliance, which was called Theater LA at the time. And I was on the board with him, and Jeff had this great job where he was running a performing arts center and a great theater with 1,300 seats, and he was always happy and seemed to be having a great life. And he had 2 kids, and everything seemed so perfect. I said, Jeff, I just want your life one day. How do I just take your life? And he literally called me 10 years later, right after I got out of grad school. He said, remember about 10 years ago when you said you wanted my life? You want to come and work for me? We're doing interviews right now for my, for an associate position here. Huh. So I did that. I worked for Jeff for a while, and then when Jeff retired, I took over for Jeff. Retired. He of course immediately went back to work at another job in New York City.
Of course, yeah.
Retired for 20 minutes.
So you did get his life.
I literally took his life, and I have his wife now and his kids. It's very creepy. It's very weird. It would have made it much easier to just take the whole life. I do have 2 kids, a boy and a girl. It's very similar to Jeff's in the end.
Has somebody said that to you now? They want your life?
Not yet, but I'm ready to— this is the time. If you want to just come and take my life, tell me now. 10 years to go and you'll be, you'll be me. So I did that and I still freelance direct. Now I teach at UCLA and I run La Mirada, so it keeps me pretty busy.
You have to think as the producer, you it is a business, there are money sides, but there is that passionate creative side of you as a, as a director, as a writer, as an actor, and managing that for you personally, how do you keep both of them, both of them going?
It's hard. That's a great question, and thank you for noticing. That is what I do, and I do— if I swing too far in one direction, I feel the other side pulling me back. If I get too much into just the business side of running a theater and a it's a multi-million dollar business, which I'm lucky enough to work on. My creative side says, "Hey, hey, you gotta start doing some art here. Don't just get caught up in the business side." And I hope those two things balance each other, at least keep my values in the right place, so that I remember the whole point of it is for the art and for the community that a theater can build, a central place where ideas can be shared and your thoughts can be challenged, and sometimes you can just escape into a musical that just takes you away someplace else. Those are all important things, and if I keep my eye on the prize, it makes the business side a lot easier and more fun to do because it's all servicing the same— that side of my brain.
What support group did you have around you that A, either encouraged you, or B, pushed you?
Well, I had a great group of friends at that time. Here in LA, and that was this group that created Buffalo Nights Theater Company with me. And we were doing a lot of really interesting work, and they're all doing great now. They're all in theater, film, and television doing really well. At the time, we were all starting out and hungry, and I went to New York for a while, which was terrific, but one of the reasons I wanted to come back to LA is here in LA, I felt like all my friends were actors and nobody was working, which was great because we could spend all day coming up with what was next and what was creative and what we were going to do and how we were going to put something together. In New York, all my friends like had real jobs and they were going off to the bank or to the advertising firm and I was just terrible just mixing all that. So I just was waiting around all day to go to the theater at night and all my friends were real people. So that support— so I wanted to move back here partly for that support group to have everybody back and connected to me so we could dream together and that helps you kind of get through the next day and propel to the next thing and do something in that time you're waiting for the next paid gig. And eventually we were able to pay ourselves through Buffalo Nights, through grants and other things, so that was exciting. But you need that, you need a lot of friends, and you need to have some confidence.
